Teochew Chwee Kueh (Steamed Water Rice Cake)

Chwee Kueh is a famous dish that almost everyone in Singapore would have tried before, or if not, would at the very least know about. Chwee Kueh, literally known as steamed water rice cake, has a very simple recipe. Just mix rice flour with water and some basic condiments such as salt and oil, then steam it to get the rice cake. This dish is always served with chye poh, a preserved radish that is both sweet and salty and stir-fried so as to give it a nice fragrance when you eat the rice cakes with it.

It is very amazing how a simple dish like this can be so delicious and tempting, although of course, we all know very well it is the oiliness that makes it so delicious. The chye poh is stir-fried with loads of oil which in turn is served with the rice cakes to give it its taste (i.e. you can’t eat the rice cakes without the chye poh). For me, there’s one more thing that cannot be missing from this dish – chilli! Not the sweet sambal kind but the oily Cantonese chilli oil! Which makes the dish all the more oily, but if you are eating this dish only once in a year like me, just go for it. You will not regret it!

Ingredients:

Oil: 1/2 cup

Shallot: 60g, finely chopped

Garlic: 30g, finely chopped

Chye poh: 150g (salted, sweetened or a mixture of both, rinsed and dried)